Spring
by Hammy Uchiha
Summary: Sasuke has managed to briefly escape from the darkness of Orochimaru's lair to enjoy the snow, but he's being watched...


**I don't know what inspired the angst, but here it is. It may have been inspired by the Oro-dress, but that is always debatable. I think its quite possible I have an obsession with Sasuke's whole abandonment of the village and how he could return. I can't shake the feeling that he really isn't the cold hearted person he wants us to think he is...  
**

**Note: I don't own Naruto, or Obito would never have died.**

**Please Read and Review or Sai's abs might have to have a word with you. **

let it begin...

**Spring**

**By Hammy Uchiha**

_This blasted 'dress'…_

Sasuke shivered in the cold frosty air of early February. It numbed him in the half shirt. He had tried several times to coax it into being a full shirt to no result, it was made to be a half shirt and that's how it was determined to stay. He had Kabuto to thank for that, but it was liable that Sasuke wasn't now or ever going to thank anyone for this absolutely ridiculous shirt.

Snowflakes danced on the icy breeze and the Uchiha was forced to hug himself to keep warm. He wasn't really sure anymore how he had gotten Orochimaru to let him leave the lair, but somehow he had gotten permission… _Permission? Hn, since when did I need permission to do anything!? _ Sasuke turned his dark eyes to the sky feeling a number of enormous feelings swelling within him until he thought he would definitely explode in a million little pieces all over the white canvas of the snow. He used to hate winter, he thought dimly… but now…here… after months…years of stale snake smelling air under the earth, he was grateful for the fresh bite of the February wind.

_Back in the village it would be around Valentine's Day…_ Sasuke slammed his fist into an innocent bystander, breaking the bark with his strike, but distracting himself from thoughts of the village he had abandoned. _Hah, abandoned for what? This? I must have been drunk…or…_ He knew he had no one to blame but himself, but Sasuke found himself reluctant to admit it. Silently he crunched forward in the light snow, if this was to be his last day, if he had a choice, he wouldn't spend it like this, waiting on the edge of a knife. _Don't have much of choice though, do I?_

It was better like this; he tried to convince himself as he wandered a few more steps forward kicking the snow a little bit. A small part of him was calling for action, was calling that he either make a run for it, right now, or at least make a snow man or something. The Uchiha was inclined to both make the snowman and to run away, but he acted on neither. Silently he looked to the sky for the answers, and wished that he had made better decisions.

Sakura moved in silently pressing herself to the tree and watching him from a distance. The bleak surroundings fit him perfectly she thought as she watched him move. _He's so cold that he deserves a backdrop of snow._ She quietly reached for a kunai, wondering if he was still as unreasonable as he had been three years ago. She almost didn't want to find out. _He's a threat to our village._ Her knuckles whitened around the kunai as she watched him.

She couldn't see how Sasuke could live with himself after he had betrayed their village, after he had nearly killed Naruto. Sakura clenched her teeth watching him shiver in that Oro dress of his. Her younger self would have loved to see him in that half a shirt. Quietly she readied herself. She would stop him when he walked by her tree.

"Sasuke-kun! Hey, where are you? Orochimaru-sama wants you right now!"

The yell shattered the frozen silence of the forest. Sasuke and Sakura froze in mid thought, all thoughts coming crashing to a halt. Sakura watched as Sasuke punched a tree in annoyance, only succeeding bloodying his fist further.

"Sasuke!"

"I'm coming!" Sasuke yelled back hugging himself, "Tell snake butt just to chill, I'm coming," he grumbled and started to walk in the direction Kabuto's voice had come from. Silently Sasuke knew this was it.

Sakura prepared herself, her whole body tense, two more steps, one more step…

"Get out of here," said Sasuke as he passed the tree. Sakura's mind froze up.

"W...what?" she stammered forgetting she was here to stop him.

"Get out of here, unless you want to die," he said emptily still looking down the path that lay before him. Sakura hesitated as he took another step forward. She slinked further behind the tree as he moved on. Sasuke stopped and turned toward her, his eyes cold.

"You can't be here," he said again, "Or I'll have to kill you myself,"

Sakura reached desperately for the words that had suddenly abandoned her.

"Go!" he said.

"N…No!" she finally spoke jumping out from behind the tree and onto the path. "I…I…I won't just watch you give your body up to him, I don't know what he promised you, but…but…I won't watch….I can't…"

"Then don't," he said and turned away.

"Don't turn away from me!" she yelled at him, all of her frustrations finally boiling over. "And stop saying you're going to actually go through with it! I won't let you!" she cried throwing down her kunai in anger. Sasuke's hand slammed over her mouth silencing further words. His face was in hers. His onyx eyes were piercing and demanding her to listen up.

"Shut up," he hissed, "I might not kill you, but Kabuto will, I swear it," he said and took his hand off her mouth. "If you insist on wasting my time do it quickly and in a softer voice."

Just because of that Sakura felt like screaming at him, but her mind had gone blank, all words forsaken her. She stood awkwardly before him, unable to come up with the words she had been long planning to yell at him, the words that would bring him back to the village.

He waited several long minutes as she fumbled with her hands and bit her lip trying to get a hold on herself.

"If you've got nothing to say, I have to go," he said and turned. Sakura violently lashed out grabbing a hold of the sleeve of his Oro dress. The loose shirt slid off his shoulder causing a grumble from the Uchiha who tugged it back up.

"What is it?" he demanded. Sakura grabbed a hold of the front of his shirt and dragged his face to eye level.

"I won't let you go!" she at last burst out. "Without you… it's like…it's like…" she stammered as several lonely tears slipped from her eyes, "its like…I'm half a Sakura, like I'm missing part, you tore a hole in me Sasuke, and it hurts!" she cried desperately. His face, so smooth and pale remained impassive and the Uchiha tightly restrained himself from shouting the same thing right back at her.

"He'll hear you," was all he managed to say.

"Dangit Sasuke! I don't care!" she cried sobbing now looking him in the eye and finding no reflection of her feelings. "I don't care," she whispered pressing her damp face to his chest. "Just come home," she sobbed hugging him tightly.

For several seconds she was just there, crying hysterically, while Sasuke forced himself not to let the floodgates open. Not to let his pent up feelings out. Finally trembling faintly he took a hold of her shoulders and pushed her away from himself once again instating the darkness that divided them.

"I don't have a choice," he said what he knew was a down right lie. She stood there looking at him with her tear-filled eyes and he only felt worse.

"Sasuke…!" the yell shattered the silence again. "What's taking you?!" yelled Kabuto. "Is someone out there? I heard voices!"

"I'm coming!" shouted Sasuke back clenching and unclenching his fist. _There was no choice. There never was._

"I'm sorry," he said to Sakura meaning it with every ounce of his being. She was trying to wipe away the tears.

"Don't," she choked. "Don't leave me," she said reaching out to him. Sasuke denied her hand.

"I have to go," he said quietly.

"There's winter," said Sakura looking him in the eye. "But spring always comes afterwards, right? Right, Sasuke?" she asked him, the tears returning.

"Spring may come for you," he said. "For the village…" he whispered already about to turn. "But spring…spring will never come for me," he said and walked back through the snow to hand over his body to Orochimaru.

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**Please Review**

**-Hammy Uchiha**


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